because from what I've heard, breathing isn't optional.

The weight of their grief

We approach the humorless with humor; I think it’s the only way to cope. Sometimes there’s nothing to be done. Sometimes it’s sudden. Sometimes it’s a sudden insult but death doesn’t come suddenly. Then, their watch begins.

The rules about how many visitors to an ICU room go out the window. As many people as that room can fit, and outside visiting hours too. Sometimes we break other rules too, to allow children and the burning of smudges. The treatment decisions are guided by family, not the doctors anymore. The doctors have washed their hands.

The neurosurgeon has seen the CT scan (ah, technology) and too much time has passed since the bleeding begun. Your brain, in a box. Increase the pressure too much and it becomes toothpaste squeezed through the hole at the bottom of your skull. The phrase we use for this injury is “not compatible with life.” It’s less politically correct amongst ourselves. There’s just joking: “go towards the light;” when we have to shut off life support sometimes we dryly refer to it as being “the grim reaper.” In his room, though, it’s different. Their vigil makes it a sacred space.

Those who enter do so only out of necessity, with more respect than even the cemetery commands. We are quiet and as discreet as we can be, but somehow it still feels like a violation to go inside and do my job. Moreover, it’s difficult to watch their internal struggle: they have heard our words, they know there is no hope, but they reach for it anyway. They are grieving not only the death that hasn’t happened yet but the lost opportunities for his recovery. They’re grieving their lost hope at the same time as his loss, and all their losses before it as well.

They share these losses with me when I enter, while he actively dies; they’ve lived through this more than once. I try and keep my words to a minimum, aside from condolences and apologies for my intrusion. I am more proper than I usually am, even on a good day. I ask if they want the door closed. I enforce silence in myself. It isn’t my words that they want.

When I leave that room I feel like I walk slower, my breathing and my body heavier. I am moving in slow motion through water, the resistance of the air demanding more of my strength. I am brought back to where I was, when I last experienced such grief. I say a silent prayer for the fact that I had no vigil, in retrospect the finality of these things is a gift. I try to shake off the heaviness of it all, perhaps remarking at it to my manager or a coworker.

It is impossible to be wholly unaffected when they only currency in use is hope, and I have empty pockets. I can’t make this easier. All I can do is try to remember enough that it’s harder to forget, as I will eventually, as I always seem to. I’ll be reminded again of their grief soon enough, except at the same time it won’t be theirs, it will be someone new, and the grief will be fresh, and I will have my task, to be the cup-bearer of the good death.